Patricia Potter (37 page)

“Thomas,” Lobo said again in a low commanding voice. “I’ve got to know.”

It was a reasonable request, Brady realized. They had to learn if he had the guts to draw anymore, or whether he could even hold the gun steady. He would soon find out. He stood, and so did Lobo, the two men no more than four feet away from each other, their legs slightly apart, balanced.

Lobo’s hand was hovering near his gun. “Now,” he said suddenly.

Brady’s right hand went to the gun and drew it in one quick motion. It didn’t catch on the holster as it had when he’d practiced the past few days, and his hand wasn’t shaking. Lobo’s gun was also out, had been out several seconds before his own, but Brady knew he hadn’t done badly.

His gaze went to Lobo’s face, and there was the slightest smile on the gunslinger’s lips.

Brady knew he was smiling, too, as he slid the gun back into the holster.

“You didn’t lose your nerve, did you,” Lobo said. It wasn’t a question.

“More like my taste for it,” Brady answered curtly, not particularly liking the conversation but knowing it was important. They might face trouble together, and Lobo had the right to know what to expect.

“Want to tell me why?”

“I killed an unarmed man.”

Lobo stared at him. “Knowing your reputation, I expect you had reason.”

“Yep, thought I did, but that day I learned I wasn’t any better than him. There wasn’t any difference between him and me. Not anymore.”

Lobo rubbed the back of his neck, wincing slightly when he felt some of the salve from his hand settle there. “Some snakes just need killing.”

“A lawman can’t think that way.”

“Most of the ones I know do. They don’t care if a man’s bad. Just that he’s wanted, or even might be wanted.” There was a deep note of bitterness in his voice.

Brady turned away from him. “I didn’t operate that way.”

“I heard you were good.”

“I heard you were fast.”

“And not so good?” There was wry amusement in the question.

Brady turned back to him and faced Lobo. “I’d have run you out of town faster than a chicken runs from the dinner pot.”

“You would have tried.”

Brady chuckled humorlessly. “Yep, I would have tried.”

“And now?”

Brady hesitated, then said honestly, “I’m damned glad you’re here.”

“It galls the hell out of you to say that, doesn’t it?”

Brady let a few seconds go by. Lobo had been honest with him; he could be no less. “A day ago, maybe.”

“I haven’t changed, Thomas.”

“Maybe I have.”

“What if someone offers you a bottle?”

“You don’t pull punches, do you?”

Lobo shifted his weight slightly. “You have to depend on me. I might have to depend on you.”

“All right. I don’t know what I’d do if someone offered me a drink. Good enough for you?”

“Yeah.” Lobo sounded satisfied, and that irked Brady. He didn’t know why.

“I’m getting some rest. You may be some damn Indian who doesn’t need any, but I do.”

Lobo let the word pass. He’d purposefully baited Brady. “Be ready to start again at dawn. Send Chad to relieve me then.”

Brady walked away, his head shaking, and Lobo was glad to be at peace with the night. It was the only thing he understood.

S
ULLIVAN WAS NOT
at his office when Marisa arrived. Instead, there was a note on the door.
Gone to Appleton ranch. Don’t know when I’ll be back.

She tried the door. Perhaps she could wait awhile. It was not yet dark, and her father was going to be furious anyway. A few more minutes wouldn’t matter.

The door was open, and she went inside. The office was plainly furnished, and she wondered about the rest of the rooms. She knew she shouldn’t pry, but her eyes kept going to the door that led into what she knew were his living quarters. She had never been inside them.

Her hand went to the doorknob of the room, even as she told herself she shouldn’t, and her fingers turned the knob, even as her conscience scolded her. She could smell the scent of spice and soap as she looked around a room as plain as the outer office.

It was uncommonly neat, but then, there wasn’t much to clutter it except a wall lined with books. There was a bed, and a table next to it. An oil lamp sat next to a neat stack of books. In the middle of the room there was a table and two chairs, and there were more books. She went to the table beside the bed, reached for one of the volumes, and looked at its title. Poems by Walt Whitman. She opened it up to a place marked by a piece of paper and studied the title above the words, “O Captain! My Captain.”

She read the mournful words and felt a terrible sadness.

“He was a nurse during the Civil War.” The words came from the doorway, and Marisa dropped the book. She knew her face was red with embarrassment for snooping, yet she was so glad to see him, even more pleased to see the tender amusement in his eyes, as if he understood her need to know more about him.

“Who?” she asked, trying to absorb his words.

“Walt Whitman.”

“Were…you in the war?”

“Yes.”

“A doctor?”

He nodded.

“Was it terrible?”

“Worse than any hell a man can imagine.”

“Is that…how you got malaria?”

“No. I caught it in Louisiana. That’s where I was raised.”

Marisa suddenly realized how little she knew about him. He had come to Newton not long after the war, and he’d never talked much about himself. The townspeople were too pleased about having a real doctor to ask too many questions.

“You were with the South?” Most people in Colorado had favored the North.

He nodded.

Her eyes went back to the book. “Willow used to read that poem in class. It’s about Abraham Lincoln.”

“Yes,” he said softly.

“But…”

“There were good men on both sides, Marisa.”

“Most of the men I know who fought in the war hate Rebs.”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Is that why…?”

“I don’t talk about the war because I don’t like thinking about it. My father was killed at Shiloh, and my mother, sister, and…fiancee were killed on a boat shelled by Union troops. After the war, when I returned, I found that the land my family owned for generations had been taken for taxes. I probably should have cared more than I did, but with everyone I loved gone, it just didn’t matter anymore. I’d had enough of hatred and killing, and I knew the Colorado weather was a helluva lot better for my health. And now you know everything, my curious little Marisa.”

She did, and she wished she didn’t.

“Fiancee?” she said.

He nodded. “That was a long time ago, Marisa.”

“What was her name?”

“Julie,” he answered softly.

Marisa felt all her insides hurt. “Is that why…you never married?”

“No,” he said, and then hesitated a moment before continuing. “We were…engaged before I contracted malaria, just before I went to medical school. The attacks became worse during the war. I was thinking about canceling the engagement, but before I could get leave, she—was killed.”

“Did you love her?”

It was a foolish question, Marisa knew, and she wished instantly she could take it back.

But Sullivan merely regarded her thoughtfully. “Yes. We grew up together. We were very much alike.”

Marisa felt a crushing blow to her chest. She needed no one to explain that she and Sullivan did not have a great deal in common, only the intensity of attraction. But more than for herself, she felt a great sadness for him. He had lost everything.

“Don’t look at me like that, Marisa,” he said, as if probing her thoughts. “I have a very satisfying life now.”

“You didn’t say happy.”

“A very happy life, then.”

“You’re lying.”

His eyebrows drew together in mock consternation. “Am I now, Miss Marisa? And what do you think would make me happy?”

“Me.” There. It was said. And she was glad.

The amusement left his eyes, replaced by something much more intense. “And how could an old man like me make you happy?”

“You’re not old.”

“Old enough to be your father.”

“Only if you were a very precocious boy.”

He chuckled. “Like you’re a very precocious young lady?” But there was no sting to the words, only amazed appreciation.

“I know what I want.”

“Do you, Marisa? Or is it just the challenge?”

“I don’t think so,” she said honestly.

He leaned back and laughed. “You are a remarkable young lady, Marisa.”

“Remarkable enough to kiss?”

“Oh, yes, I think so.” He was still chuckling when he leaned down his head to kiss her.

He had thought to make the kiss light, to erase the memory of the other one, but it was a foolish hope. One taste of her, and his resolve disappeared. Her touch made him feel young again, young and excited and full of hope.

His lips hardened against hers and he felt her arms go around him. He was thirty-six, and he’d lived like a monk more years than he wanted to remember. And now his body was reacting with an enthusiasm he hadn’t realized he had. For years now he had buried himself in his practice, in books, and denied himself this kind of pleasure. He had long since decided not to marry, not to make any woman suffer over the illness that came and went without warning. And he’d decided not to make that decision more painful by letting himself fall in love.

But now he knew he had always been in love with Marisa Newton, ever since she was an imp of a child always in mischief but never the malicious kind. She was so full of life, so full of light and laughter and gaiety. He had watched her grow, and when she had become a lovely young woman, he had admitted somewhere deep inside a silent, unfulfilled love. In agony he had watched her growing interest in him, the way she gravitated to him at parties, the way she lingered to talk in the street, the way her eyes warmed when she saw him.

He had tried to convince himself that Marisa wanted only to add him to the list of eligible men who courted her favors, but he grudgingly had to admit that she was too honest for that game.

Still, he thought no good could come from an entanglement with her. He would never be whole, never be what Marisa deserved. He didn’t think he could bear to see her face when he was sick, when she might have to do everything for him, the most intimate type of care. He often became violent during those episodes, wrapped in the blind black fury of the past. One time, when Willow was caring for him, he’d returned to consciousness and saw the bruises on her. He’d never forgiven himself for that.

But as his mouth met Marisa’s, he could think of nothing but the sweetness of the moment, how strong and wanted and needed he felt, not as a doctor, but as a man. The kiss deepened, and he knew a craving hunger, assuaged only partially by the warm glow that spread from every point of contact.

She opened her mouth slightly, and his tongue played along her lips, then inside her mouth. She moved closer, and he could feel her body trembling, just as his own tensed and grew rigid in response.

His arms went around her, holding her tightly, as if afraid she’d disappear. But then years of control took over. He stiffened, and his hands fell from her back as he moved away, but one hand went up and touched her mouth, now frowning in puzzlement and dismay.

“Don’t go away from me,” she said.

“I don’t want to,” he said honestly. “But if I don’t, we might do something we’ll both regret.”

“You love me,” she accused.

“Perhaps I do.”

“I love you.”

“Terhaps.”

“Then why—”

“You may think you love me now, pretty Marisa. But what if you had to care for me like a mother cares for a baby?”

“I would love you more.”

“Because you’d pity me.” She’d never heard bitterness in Sullivan before, and she flinched.

“No,” she denied. “No one could ever pity you.”

Her answer would have pleased him if he’d believed it. Perhaps she herself believed it, but he couldn’t. “Pretty Marisa,” he said again. “You think you could be a doctor’s wife?”

“I can be anything I want to be.”

“No big ranch? No stable full of horses?” He knew she loved to ride.

He was gently mocking her, and she felt the birth of anger inside. “You don’t think much of me, do you?”

The mockery instantly disappeared. “I think a great deal of you, Marisa. If I didn’t, I’d marry you today.”

She grinned at the admission. “Would you?”

He nodded.

“Well, then I’ll just have to do something to destroy that good opinion of me.” She gave him an impish grin and spun around.

“Marisa!”

“Good-bye, Sullivan.”

Sullivan watched the door close, wondering what in the hell she would do this time. He felt like kicking himself for saying some of the things he had, for admitting to feelings that were foolish. But they had been bottled up inside for a long time and had simply exploded.